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E-BULLETIN
UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science
July 11, 2007
DEAN'S
LETTER
Although the summer brings a sense of quiet to the campus, we
are still engaged in an exciting period of renewal and transformation
here at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied
Science. We are working on all parts of our mission to be a leader
in research, education and community service.
As always, our annual commencement was a very
special day. Nearly 6,500 students and guests attended the June
16 event. Our keynote speaker was Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne
President Jim Maser, who encouraged our graduates to include eco-conscious
values in their work on the future of technological innovation.
Looking forward to fall, the Engineering I replacement building
on Portola Way is almost complete. We hope to see many of you
here on October 16 for the grand opening. This remarkable new
structure will provide state-of-the-art laboratories for our faculty
and modern classrooms to facilitate teaching.
Our work is continuing in the classroom as well. We are very proud
of our revised undergraduate curriculum, which emphasizes breadth
across disciplines and includes courses in rapidly evolving areas
such as nanotechnology. We are pleased that our graduates will
continue to have an excellent background to start careers in a
wide variety of fields.
However our efforts to ensure a broad pool of talented engineers
and scientists for tomorrow start before freshmen arrive on campus.
The School is committed to widening the pipeline of engineering
students through outreach to Southern California K-12 schools.
Part of that mission is happening this summer, as we host 30 high
school students from the Los Angeles area in our Summer Research
Program. Thanks to a generous grant from the Nicholas Endowment,
these students are receiving an excellent introduction to the
research process in laboratories throughout all of the School’s
departments and at the Center for Embedded Network Sensing.
I am pleased to note that last month, electrical engineering professor
William Kaiser received the 2007 UCLA Gold Shield Faculty Prize.
Given by the Academic Senate and the UCLA Gold Shield Alumnae
to mid-career faculty members, this prestigious award honors exceptional
accomplishments in research, undergraduate teaching and service
to the university and beyond. In addition, the Academic Senate
also announced that electrical engineering professor Behzad Razavi
has won a campus-wide distinguished teaching award.
Finally, I would like acknowledge two people at the very heart
of the school who have just retired after giving the school a
combined 71 years of service: Stephen E. Jacobsen, associate dean
of academic and student affairs and professor of electrical engineering,
has been a member of the faculty since 1969. Judy Pike, the director
of academic personnel, has been on the staff since 1973. On behalf
of the School, I thank them for their dedication, commitment and
many years of service to UCLA Engineering.
Sincerely,
Vijay K. Dhir
Dean
FEATURE
STORIES
 Pratt
& Whitney Rocketdyne’s Jim Maser encourages UCLA Engineering
graduates to find eco-friendly solutions.
Nearly 6,500 guests and students from the UCLA Henry Samueli School
of Engineering and Applied Science gathered at Pauley Pavilion
in Westwood on June 16 to hear Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne
president Jim Maser deliver the 2007 commencement address.
To read more, click
here.
OTHER NEWS
William Kaiser wins UCLA Gold Shield Faculty Prize
William Kaiser, an electrical engineering professor at the UCLA
Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, has received
the 2007 Gold Shield Faculty Prize from the UCLA Gold Shield Alumnae.
The annual prize is awarded to a full professor with extraordinary
promise and accomplishment in research or creative activity, and
an outstanding record in teaching, especially of undergraduates.
Equal weight is given to each. This is the first time that a faculty
member from UCLA Engineering has won the award. To read more,
click
here.
In Memoriam: T.H. Lin
Tung-Hua Lin, a professor emeritus at the UCLA Henry Samueli School
of Engineering and Applied Science who was a major contributor
to the safety of building materials and a pioneer in China’s
aviation history, died on June 18 of heart failure. He was 96.
At UCLA Engineering, Lin made significant contributions to the
safety of building materials. Lin derived
an analytical method that predicts the soundness of metal structures
in airplanes, buildings and bridges. To
read more, click
here.
 In
Memoriam: Joseph Miller
Joseph Miller, an adjunct professor at the UCLA Henry Samueli
School of Engineering and Applied Science and a former vice president
and general manager at TRW Applied Technology Group, died on July
5. He was 70. Miller was a triple graduate
of UCLA Engineering, earning bachelor’s, master's and PhD
degrees (’57, ’58 and ’62). He had a distinguished
career in spaceflight engineering, in high-energy laser research
and as an executive at TRW. He returned to the School in 1997
to teach an undergraduate course on engineering design. To read
more, click
here.
Alumna appointed to President’s
National Medal of Science Committee
President Bush has appointed Linda Katehi, Provost of the University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and UCLA Engineering’s 2006
alumnus of the year, to the President's Committee on the National
Medal of Science. Katehi earned her master’s and PhD in
electrical engineering from UCLA in 1981 and 1984. Her three-year
term will expire in December 2009. The committee, which comprises
12 scientists and engineers appointed by the president, evaluates
nominees for the National Medal of Science, America’s highest
honor for scientific achievement. Katehi, who was the John A.
Edwardson Dean of Engineering at Purdue University, began her
duties as provost at Illinois in April 2006. To read more, click
here.
Engineering Faculty Win Awards and Honors
Electrical engineering professor Asad A. Abidi
has been selected by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers, Inc. Board of Directors to receive the prestigious
2008 IEEE Donald O. Pederson Award in Solid-State Circuits for
his “pioneering and sustained contributions in the development
of RF-CMOS.” This award was established by the IEEE Board
of Directors in 1987 to honor an individual, or team of up to
three, for outstanding contributions to solid-state circuits,
as exemplified by benefit to society, enhancement to technology,
and professional leadership. This is an IEEE-wide award and the
highest in the field.
Bioengineering professor Daniel T. Kamei
is a recipient of a Walter H. Coulter Foundation Early Career
Award. This award program provides funding for assistant professors
in established biomedical engineering departments within North
America. The award seeks to support biomedical research that is
translational in nature, and to encourage and assist eligible
biomedical engineering investigators to establish themselves in
academic careers involving translational research. The translational
research projects are directed at promising technologies with
the goal of progressing toward commercial development and entering
clinical practice. This award is supporting his research directed
at designing drugs for the treatment of malignant gliomas.
In June, computer science professor Judea
Pearl was awarded an honorary doctorate at the University
of Toronto 2007 Convocation. To read more, click
here.
In May, Rajit Gadh, professor
of mechanical and aerospace engineering and director of the Wireless
Internet for Mobile Enterprise Consortium, delivered the keynote
address at a Caltech/MIT Enterprise Forum, held at Caltech. The
event's theme was "The Dizzying Convergence of Electronic
Devices and Services: What are the Opportunities for Engineers?"
MEDIA
WATCH: UCLA ENGINEERING NEWS HIGHLIGHTS
PC Magazine
Future
Watch: Ultra-Hard Materials
Scientists at UCLA have created a lower-cost material that rivals
diamond's strength. This ultra-hard material, called rhenium diboride,
is made from a combination of the relatively soft metal osmium
with rhenium, a fairly dense, soft metal that is next to osmium
on the periodic table. Richard B. Kaner, a UCLA professor of inorganic
chemistry and materials science and engineering, says his team
made the material "ultra-incompressible" (resistant
to shape deformation—a necessary condition for hardness)
by finding metals that are already incompressible and working
to harden them.
Los Angeles Times
Passings:
Tung-Hua Lin, 96; UCLA professor designed airplane
Tung-Hua Lin, 96, a longtime civil engineering professor at UCLA
who designed China's first twin-engine airplane, died Monday of
heart failure at Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center, the university
announced. Lin, a member of the UCLA faculty since 1955, studied
the soundness of metal structures in airplanes, buildings and
bridges. His research on earthquake stress in construction materials
led to a fellowship at the prestigious National Academy of Engineering.
Daily Bruin
UCLA
researchers create wireless network to connect drivers
Mario Gerla, a computer science professor at the UCLA Henry Samueli
School of Engineering and Applied Science, created a wireless
network to exist between cars, allowing for the transfer of information
between cars at the press of a button while on the road. The project
is based on the principles of a wireless, mobile ad-hoc networking
platform, or MANET, that allows moving vehicles within a range
of 100 to 300 meters of each other to connect and, car by car,
create a network with a wide range, according to a press release.
Medgadget
The
Mobile Internet: Your Car Could Save a Life
The Henry Samueli School of Engineering at UCLA is doing some
breakthrough work with mobile WiFi. Their goal is to make a "node"
out of every car on the road, which communicates with the car
next to it and so on, to make a moving and dynamic internet. The
technology could have a huge impact on traffic, accidents, and
most importantly emergency responders.
Los Angeles Times
Beach
sand's hidden dangers?
Although most research on beach pathogens has focused on microorganisms
in the water, researchers are beginning to track bacteria in beach
sand as well.
Last summer, UCLA researcher Jennifer Jay reported elevated levels
of Escherichia coli and enterococci in sand at two sheltered beaches,
Cabrillo Beach in San Pedro and Mother's Beach in Marina del Rey.
Los Angeles Times
Yes,
Virginia, he's coming to lead UCLA
Gene Block is leaving horse country for freeway central…
At 58, he is moving across three time zones for a new, very big
job. On Aug. 1 he is scheduled to become chancellor of UCLA, which
is about a century younger and has about twice as many students
as the University of Virginia's 19,000.
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